


After a Storm Comes a Calm

by talefeathers



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Brother Feels, Drabble, Gen, Infinity War, No Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Spoilers, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-17
Updated: 2017-11-17
Packaged: 2019-02-03 11:46:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12747681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talefeathers/pseuds/talefeathers
Summary: Thor is dying in his arms, but Loki can't afford to fall apart.





	After a Storm Comes a Calm

**Author's Note:**

> For No Shame November, since Grief/Mourning fic is my self-indulgent garbage of choice, I posted a very straightforward prompt call on my Tumblr: "Who's dead/dying and who's fucking crying about it?" Here's the second prompt fill for @hulksmashley, who asked for Thor dead/Loki crying.
> 
> Also, I tagged this for Graphic Depictions of Violence just because it opens with a pretty gross image, but after the first paragraph that's it for depictions of violence!
> 
> Double also, there is an extremely minor reference to something from Thor: Ragnarok, but no actual spoilers.
> 
> I think that's it. Thanks for reading!

The Infinity Gauntlet made a sickening squelch as Thanos wrenched it back from Thor’s chest. Thor stumbled back, one, two steps, before Thanos shoved him the rest of the way, straight into Loki, who stood frozen behind.

“If you want something done right,” Thanos sighed in a deep baritone that thrummed through his ship’s foundations. He turned to face the vessel’s bow, gazing idly out at the splashes of galaxy beyond it while blood dripped to the floor from his right hand. “This is the last time you will survive failing me, little god.”

Thor’s weight almost toppled Loki, but he was able to balance quickly enough to bear him slowly to the ground. Loki knelt at the base of the dais on which Thanos stood and held Thor’s shuddering form in his lap. A cursory glance told him that Thor was beyond every form of healing he knew, but Thor didn’t seem to notice; he struggled, teeth gritted, to pull himself back up, clutching at Loki’s armor for purchase.

“L-Loki,” Thor stammered.

“Shut up,” Loki said, managing to keep a sharpness in his voice even as a numbness chilled his blood.

“Thanos, he’s – Loki, he’s going to –”

“I know what he’s going to do,” Loki said.

Someone less perceptive might not have seen the slight turn of Thanos’s head, the narrow slit of his watching eye, but Loki did; his wasn’t a cunning that could be switched off, even at a time like this. He exhaled the tightness that had risen in his throat and he forced his expression to harden.

“ _Loki,_ ” Thor growled. He hooked his fingers into the collar of Loki’s breastplate and yanked it toward him; Loki took the hint and met his gaze.

“You have to stop him,” Thor said. He grimaced, then, seeming to realize at last that part of his chest was missing. “Please, brother –”

Loki darted another glance at Thanos. When he didn’t see the glint of that watching eye, he took Thor’s hand from his breastplate and squeezed it.

“I can’t,” he said, but he locked his eyes on Thor’s again and tried to convey _I’ll try._ “There is no stopping the might of Thanos.”

Thor nodded, almost imperceptibly, gripping Loki’s hand with the last of his strength. He grinned a little, then, and a trickle of blood slid from the corner of his mouth as he did.

“Maybe,” he murmured, eyes clouding over, "you should… ‘get help.’”

Loki’s heart seemed to stall in his chest, seemed to stop, and something like suffocation clamped down on his lungs. He could only gape, struck uncharacteristically dumb, as Thor’s hand went slack in his own. As he let it slide, carefully, to the floor.

For a hovering moment, Loki’s cunning was silent. The mind that had kept him alive until now could not think, much less galvanize him to movement or speech. He felt tears swim into his eyes, and he almost let them fall, except –

That glint. That watching eye.

Loki exhaled. He pushed his hair from his face and blinked his expression back to indifference. He stood, and he adjusted his armor.

He survived.

“So ends the mighty Thor,” Loki said at last, stepping over his brother’s body without so much as a flinch to join Thanos at the helm of the ship. “You’ve no idea how long I’ve waited to say that.”


End file.
